


Dreaming the Same Bewildering Dream

by rei_c



Series: Dreams [2]
Category: Chronicles of Narnia (Movies), Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Post - Prince Caspian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-07
Updated: 2015-04-07
Packaged: 2018-03-21 16:09:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3698582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rei_c/pseuds/rei_c
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the same smile he gave her their first stay in Narnia, every time one of the ladies from the other lands came to visit. It's his secret smile, just for her, and makes her warm inside. He reaches out, moves a strand of hair away from her face. "What next?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dreaming the Same Bewildering Dream

Lucy grins brightly at Edmund. "You're it," she says. Edmund grins back, bending slightly, setting his feet. Her eyes widen as his narrow and she takes off running with a muffled squeal. 

"You've got until twenty-five!" Edmund calls out. 

The professor's house is fantastic for this sort of game. Every nook and cranny has a shadow and some of them even lead to crawl-spaces and secret passageways, there are dozens of chests and cupboards to hide in, and the floors only creak in certain areas. Lucy's explored more of the house than anyone else but Edmund's quick and clever; he's always been the best seeker. 

She runs, can hear him calling out numbers. His voice fades as she turns two corners and runs up a flight of stairs, ducking into an old study and turning a wall of books, slipping through the gap into another room, smaller and dustier. Lucy closes the wall and catches her breath, one hand over her chest, before she turns to look out the window. She listens for Edmund but doesn't hear him, and is completely taken off-guard when he taps her on the shoulder. 

Lucy whirls, reaching automatically for the dagger at her waist, her other hand going up to her forehead. 

"Lu, relax," Edmund says, pulling her tight. Lucy blinks, remembers that she isn't a queen anymore and doesn't have a dagger. "It's just me, all right?" She settles against him, buries her face in his chest. "Just me. Sorry, I should've made some noise."

"'S'all right," Lucy murmurs. "I wasn't paying attention." 

Edmund's hold tightens fractionally, then he lets her go, pushing her away at the shoulders to look at her. "Well. So much for that," he says, smile wry. It's the same smile he gave her their first stay in Narnia, every time one of the ladies from the other lands came to visit. It's his secret smile, just for her, and makes her warm inside. He reaches out, moves a strand of hair away from her face. "What next?"

"Let's go find Susan," Lucy suggests, taking Edmund's hand in her own. She frowns, looks down, asks, "When did you get bigger?"

"A little more every day," Edmund says, grinning, ruffling his other hand through Lucy's hair. "Come on, shrimp. Where do you think they are?" 

\--

Edmund takes the left rooms on the second floor and Lucy the right; he starts at one end and she at the other. About three doors in, Lucy is about to open the door when she hears her oldest brother talking. She presses her ear to the door, listens; it's not eavesdropping, exactly. She's only trying to decide if they're having another serious talk or if it's safe for her to interrupt. With Susan leaving soon and Peter studying so hard for exams, she and Edmund have had to walk on eggshells from time-to-time. 

"Susan," Peter says. "Please, just stop for one minute and listen, all right?"

He sounds serious to Lucy and must to Susan as well because she sighs. Lucy can picture her sister tossing her hair over one shoulder, rolling her eyes and checking the curve of her nails. "All right, Peter. Fine. I'm listening." 

A pause, and then Peter says, quietly, "I think you should stay home. I don't think you should go to America." 

" _What_?" Even on the other side of a door, eavesdropping, Lucy winces. No, she can't imagine Susan liked hearing that. 

"You should stay with Ed and Lu," Peter goes on. "I don't like the idea of leaving them alone together, even with Eustace around." 

Susan snorts, a more unladylike noise than Lucy's heard from her sister recently. "What on earth do you mean, Peter? And why do you think they'd listen to me? Ed's turned into such a sly little creature and Lucy's practically wild." 

Peter snaps back, "Lucy's not wild and Edmund is not sly." His immediate response has Lucy tempted to step away and go hide but she doesn't, just takes a deep breath as Peter must. He sounds calmer when he goes on. "Susan, please."

She lifts her ear, looks down the hall and sees Edmund already coming for her. He always seems to know exactly when she needs him, always knows right where she is. When he gets closer, Lucy motions for Edmund to be quiet and he gives her a look but doesn't say anything, leaning against the door. Lucy can feel him breathing, can feel the heat coming off of his body. She closes her eyes. 

"I'm just saying," Peter carries on. "Don't you see it, Susan? Don't you look at them sometimes and wonder?" 

Edmund's breath, so steady and even, stutters. 

Susan laughs, that high and tinkling noise she perfected once they came back from Narnia after Caspian, the one that seems to draw boys to her, moths to her flame. "Oh, Pete. I think you've been spending too much time studying. What sort of nonsense is the professor putting in your head these days. Edmund and Lu? _Really_?"

"Susan," Peter says. Lucy gets chills; he sounds like the High King. "Think about it. Please." 

Movement from inside startles Lucy. She jumps, bumps an elbow into Edmund. He wraps his arms around her and steadies them both. Lucy lets out a deep breath. She forces herself to relax. 

Their sister speaks, says, "There's really nothing to think about, Peter. I'm going to America and you're to study. Edmund and Lucy will have to put up with Eustace. After the end of summer, we'll all come back together and things will be fine. You'll have made into university, Edmund will have hopefully grown up, and our aunt and uncle will have hopefully tamed Lucy even the slightest bit." 

Peter pauses, finally asks, "And you?" 

Susan laughs. "Don't worry about me, Peter. Worry about your marks. I'll be fine. I can take care of myself." 

"You always have," Peter says, softer because Lucy has to strain to hear what he's saying. "And not always in the best way. Be careful, Sue." 

Edmund's heart is racing. Lucy can feel the pulse fluttering in his wrists and fingers over hers, can feel his heart pounding from where Edmund's chest is pressed to Lucy's back. She wonders if he can feel hers doing the same, blood rushing through her like it hasn't since she ran through a forest searching for Aslan. She wonders why it's happening now, what it means. 

"Peter, I always am," Susan replies. 

Lucy's frozen, almost squeaks when Edmund pulls her away, taking her by the hand and leading her down the hall, around the corner, into a different room filled with old furniture. He sits her down, perches on a coffee table covered in cotton sheeting, and holds her hands in his. He looks concerned and Lucy can't figure out why, just like she can't figure out where this room came from. She's never seen it before and she thought she'd explored every room on this floor. 

"Are you all right?" he asks, voice low, concerned, eyes searching hers for any hint of distress. 

"What on earth were they talking about?" she asks, bewildered. Edmund's too close, all of a sudden. She tears her hands out of her brother's, stands up and moves to get some air. "Ed, what's going on?" She turns to look at him, pauses mid-step when she sees the shuttered look in his eyes. "Ed? Edmund, tell me." 

He shakes his head, stands up as well and tucks his hands into his pockets. "It's nothing to worry about," he says. "We should be more worried at the thought of being stuck with Eustace for a summer."

Lucy looks at her brother, really _looks_ , and what she sees worries her. If only they were in Narnia, then she'd be able to ask the trees or the rivers or even Aslan about what Peter and Susan were talking about. If they were in Narnia, she thinks, then Edmund wouldn't have that bruised look in his eyes. 

She moves, then, the way she did when she was a young queen and had decades of rule flying out in front of her. Without a sound, she runs for Edmund, holding him in a tight hug. One of his hands lifts, cradles the back of her skull, the other wraps firm around her back. 

The two of them, like this, seems to be the only thing she understands in a world tilting out of control. 

\--

The cab puffs away, belching black smoke, while Lucy and Edmund stand on the drive. Neither of them wants to move toward the front door but Edmund takes a deep breath, bumps Lucy with his elbow and picks up her case as well as hers. 

"Come on, then, Lu," he says. "It's not going to disappear while we're standing here. And if it does, well, then we won't have any tea. I don't know about you but I'm famished." 

Lucy appreciates her brother's bravado even if it isn't necessary. 

She follows Edmund up the drive, wrings her hands while they wait for someone to open the door. Edmund wraps an arm around her shoulders, pulls her close. She settles with his mere presence, thinks that she'll never fear a thing with Edmund always at her side. 

The door opens and Eustace peers out at them, sneer painted across his face. "Oh, it's _Pevensies_ ," he says. "No one important, then, not if their own family can't be bothered to deal with them. How does that feel, Pevensie?" he asks Edmund, dismissing Lucy with a glance. "To know your family shunted you off on us for the summer because they don't care about you?" 

"They do care," Lucy says, can't help herself. 

Edmund's hand tightens on her shoulder before it drops down. He bends, picks up their cases, and says, "Come on, Scrubb. Let us in, there's a chap. We'll stay out of your way this summer and try not to ruin the hols for you." He sounds like he means it, on the surface, but Lucy can hear the danger underneath, the slip-slide of a lazy condescension Edmund's always had, always tried to fight back since the White Witch. 

Eustace eyes Edmund as if he knows there's a joke but can't quite figure out the punchline, then shrugs and steps to one side. "Suit yourself," he says. Edmund motions for Lucy to go first and she does, slipping past Eustace with the grace of a wood-sprite, trying to ignore the feeling of her cousin's eyes on her. Edmund follows close and quick, thankfully. 

\--

Living in the house is tense. Eustace is still the same irritating lout he's always been. He doesn't smile, doesn't laugh, and the only emotion ever to reach his eyes is a mix between disgust and priggish contemplation. 

Lucy gets shivers every time she sees it and Edmund sticks close, closer than she really thinks he should. She doesn't argue, though, and doesn't ever relax until they're alone in her room. 

Five days after they arrive, she's sitting on the bed and Edmund's leaning against the wall, looking out of the window and watching Eustace outside. Lucy had been as well but now she's staring at a painting on the wall. 

"Do you remember," Lucy says suddenly, eyes caught on the painting, "the time you got the idea in your head to." 

"Sail as far as I could across the Eastern Sea," Edmund says, cutting Lucy off and rubbing his forehead. He turns around, looks at her; Lucy can feel the heaviness of his gaze. "Except I forgot that half the crew with me were _awful_ on water. We had to turn around and come back after twenty minutes. What brought this up, Lu?" 

Lucy smiles but it's a distant expression. "That painting," she says. She hears more than sees Edmund shift to look it over. "Sometimes I think it looks like it's moving. I'm sure it isn't anything to worry about."


End file.
